Pre-assembly?

[jer7440]

Who does a test assembly of their guitars before finishing? If you do, how to you remove bridge bushings and string through ferrules before finishing. Those items seem to fit very tightly on my guitar. I don't want to ding up the guitar trying to get them back out.

[SwedishLuthier]

I always have bridge bushings in place when shooting finish. I don't have the string ferules in place (tele that is , never done a string trough TOM). Vintage style tele string ferules require the ferules to be "melted" into place

[jer7440]

My guitar is a string through TOM w/top and bottom string through ferrules. I would really like to check everything out before I finish, but I don't want all the hardware to be stuck either.

[pmarlin]

For the ferrules I use a thin rod to stick inside and hit the edge and knock them out. For the bridge posts I screw the post in the insert and use a block of wood and a wrench to fit inside the gap of the post and pry it out.

[ihocky2]

When I did a test fit on my TOM bridge, I bought a bolt that is the same thread, threaded it in and then used a ratchet to keep tightening it. It will run all the way through the bushing and bottom out in the wood, then it will try to keep threading as you turn it with the ratchet, and instead of keep lowering into the hole it will pull the bushing up.

[jer7440]

cool thanks for the ideas!

[Maiden69]

I also don't remove the TOM bushings, but I recess them so they won't be seen anyway. The ferrules come out easy, if they are too tight to put in, you will have a little hard time sliding them in once finished unless you run a drill bit once cured.

[spazzyone]

always assemble first or face the nightmares later

and bushings i leave in and tape them

never used ferrules but I'm sure id remove them first